Monday Gradings (5/29)

[blogguy]

Quick update heading into Monday. Texas wins...but I forgot in the rush to type things up that Texas was a hitter's park. They should have been on the 1.5 run list as well, and they only won by a run.

System (179 or less): 18-9...+5.17units
System (180 or more) 12-1...+8.00 units
1.5 Run Favorites: 12-9...+4.14 units
Coin Flip Dogs: 22-26...minus 2.27 units

Monday Gradings


SYSTEM PLAYS (179 or less)
St. Louis +107 over Houston (bullpen and offense even vs. Oswalt)
Texas -107 over Seattle (bullpen and offense even with off-pitcher)

SYSTEM PLAYS (180 or more)
Oakland -325 over Kansas City

1.5 RUN LINES
Texas -1.5 runs +175

COIN FLIP DOGS
LA Dodgers +109
Cincinnati +118
Florida +112
Washington +144
No dog in Milw/Pittsburgh
Arizona +132
Colorado +122
No dog in CWS/Cleveland
NYY +119
Boston +165
Minnesota +170

It's really hard to get separation amongst teams in the NL when Pittsburgh, the Cubs, and Florida are at home. Those are the teams playing the worst the past month...but that bonus point for home field lifts them into the 2-point range when making comparisons. We'll probably get St. Louis whenever they play teams with a bad bullpen because they've got a 3 bullpen and a good offense. San Diego also had a 3 bullpen this past weekend (not that you could tell with either on Sunday!), so the Cardinals didn't grade out regularly the way the AL powers do.

Back after the storm to put in the numbers. Feel free to share your thoughts if you've been using this approach or variations the past few days. Thanks!

[Superfly]

BG- great stuff as always. I just wanted to follow up on something you said "It's really hard to get separation amongst teams in the NL when Pittsburgh, the Cubs, and Florida are at home."

If you remember, I posted about 10 days ago that I thought Florida and Pitt. were the victims of some very serious bad luck, bad schedules, and young talent the first month, and I was looking for chances to play them at what I expected to be very nice prices. In the last 10 days, at home, Florida has swept the Cubs (at plus money twice), beat Pedro at a ridiculous price with the Mets coming off BTB series against the Yanks and Phils (if it were football, there woulkd have been 15 threads in the mess hall about how NYM was due for a let down in that game) and dominated the Giants tonight, again at plus money. On the road they were swept in Tampa.

Meanwhile, Pitt should have swept Houston (a blown 4 run lead in the 9th was painful) won two of three from Cincy, is berating the crap out of the Brewers tonight, and got swept at AZ.

Both of these clubs are falling into what I guess are predictable patterns. They can be bet with confidence at home (assuming the other parts of the handicap are in place) and the prices will be there. However, they are not yet mature enough to be trusted on the road. That will take some more time. This bears monitoring IMO because when they start to play better on the road, as they grow up, we will catch some very nice prices until the oddsmakers catch up.

On the flip side, in the same post, I said I expected the Mets and Reds to come back to earth. Cincy hasn't just come back, they've crashed and burned. I've made some nice coin fading them. As for the Mets, it seems the opposite of the two bad clubs. They are still spectacular at home, but can be faded on road , where they've lost 4 of 5 series. The prices on the Meets on the road are still just a little too high.

FWIW, the next group of teams I expect to see a reversal in are SL and Oakland. Pujols can't stasy this good, and there's no way managers will continue to pitch to him in key spots. Rolen has been white hot as well, but that can't keep up. And once Rolen goes for his annual 30 day stint on the DL, the Cards will cool off. I can't imagine how they've been this good, they don't have the talent of a 100 win team.

Oakland has been the biggest surprise of all to me. They are way too good to continue playing this badly. Street has blown several games, and they just don't look like they should. I expect once they get Harden and the rest of the BP back from the DL, thye'll go on a tear.

I expected the same from the Tribe, but I'm starting to think it isn't going to happen. Cliff Lee doesn't have a clue, and the entire staff looks like they've regressed. Mota has a fantastic arm, a 10 cent head, and continues to blow games, Westbrook seems to have lost something, and they did a really bad job over the winter in letting key guys go. I think their season is already over, becasuse they have two teams in front of them that are much better.

[blogguy]

Thanks for your comments SF!

Only think I'd add:

*I learned a couple of years ago to just wait until after the All-Star break for the A's to start hitting on all cylinders. Once or twice I wrote articles for somebody trying to foreshadow a hot streak because the A's were playing below expectations. It always happened at least a month later than I expected! It might be best to just wait on the A's. Some of their "Billy Ball" edge comes in the dog days of summer when they play smart while many opponents are killing time through the dog days of summer.

*Regarding St. Louis...much of their edge over the league comes from consistent if unspectacular starting pitching...and the strong bullpen. I don't really see their record as something that's Pujols "carrying" a team that's otherwise weak. They get good consistent work from the back end of their rotation, and they protect leads. They can win scoring 4 runs a game...and you don't necessarily need a superstar in the lineup to register at that number.

It will be interesting to see what happens.

Pittsburgh and Florida still look to be money-burners on the road as you said. Pirates 4-22, Marlins 7-17. I'm not sure I'm ready to get excited about Florida after sweeping the Cubs. Cubs are something like 5-21 the past four weeks. But they definitely appear to be a value side at home, particularly with decent starting pitching.

Glad things are going so well for you! Please keep us posted, and keep posting those "heads up" reports about things you expect to see in the coming series. You'll always keep us ahead of the curve!

[dinque]

i think texas and st.l are bet against.but i am not sure about the value with houston, who i think is overrated.seat is okay to play but texas is only -150 tuesday which is a little lite.a team like texas can go dead very quickly and not hitting sarloos and washburn may be the start of something.
oakland is just lost right now.not getting much from anyone

[blogguy]

Well...I'll have to disagree with you guys on St. Louis. I'm a sucker for teams who lead the league in ERA while not playing in a pitcher's park. They've got a great bullpen based on the bullpen ERA numbers...and the starting pitching has always been consistent under LaRussa.

They earned HUGE profits for backers when they first became dominant because nobody had any respet for their pitchers. They made a run at 100 wins with nobody like Randy Johnson, or Schilling, or Halladay...so they weren't every very pricey to back. The best way to win 100 games is to have decent guys at the back end of your rotation. It bites you in the playoffs because you're frontline guys may not measure up to Clemens/Oswalt or whoever. It helps make a team slump-proof to a degree.

Or course...ace Carpenter is now hurt...so that does have a chance to be a monkey wrench.

I'm guessing SUPER that one of the indicators you look at for "turnarounds" is a short-term extreme in one-run victories. If not...then at least the numbers line up with your votes against the Mets and Reds:

ONE RUN RECORDS
Mets: 15-6
Cincinnati: 11-5
St. Louis: 8-7

As you statheads know...one-run records have been shown to be more of a reflection of "luck" than an "ability" to win close games over a large sample of teams. So...some of the Mets surge this year is just the same thing that created the illusion of a surge with Washington in the first half of last year. I do think they've improved though. I was surprised the one-run mark was this high.

Threw in the Cards on the list to show that St. Louis hasn't been padding their record with a bunch of nailbiter wins.

Records in games decided by 2 or more runs (a great indicator for true quality):

St. Louis: 25-11
NY Mets: 16-13
Cincinnati: 17-18

I'll be open-minded about the slump you guys see coming for St. Louis. These guys have been so slump proof since they got the pieces in place a few years ago that I'll have to see it to believe it I guess. A lot of respect for the best ERA in the leauge...and best in their division BY A MILE with an unbalanced schedule to exploit.

While I'm here...let's update the records of the daily methodology through Monday Night's games:

System (179 or less): 20-9...+7.17units
System (180 or more) 12-2...+4.75 units
1.5 Run Favorites: 13-9...+5.89 units
Coin Flip Dogs: 26-31...minus 2.65 units

Shoebox must play a variation of the coin flip dog theory...because there sure are a lot of heartbreakers with dogs! Monday...Arizona lost by a run, Boston lost by a run, and Minnesota lost by a run. Arizona carried a lead into the bottom of the 9th...and Minnesota carried a lead into the bottom of the 8th.

Since those do sound like coin flip endings...we're probably close to getting those where we want them to be. If you look at it from the other direction...meaning, is the system finding the right games to take OUT of the coin flip dog mix...the record on those favorites is 31-11 for a profit of 11.92 units. Can't argue with that.

Note that, in terms of units...the 13-9 record at the 1.5 run lines in hitter's parks is better than the 12-2 record on huge favorites.

Again..this is an EXTREMELY simplified system. It doesn't differentiate at this point between favorites of 150 or 350...or between teams that win the grading 6.5 to 4 or 8-3. Hopefully some of you are playing around with ways to expand on the basics presented here. For now...we can't argue with the results. Making sure you include offenses and bullpens in the mix at the very least helps you see edges that are meaningful in separating one team from another.

What seems to be happening is that it's helping put teams who are bad on the road onto your go-against list. Teams who are bad on the road often have either a bad offense, bad bullpen, or both. When they lose that category in the math...and the opponent picks up that extra point for home field...you get a grading on the opponent. In the study to date, the Vegas lines aren't reflecting the true edges that home teams have over bad road teams who are lacking on offense or in the bullpen. That's the conclusion I'm drawing anyway.

Anyone have any thoughts about what the system has been showing this week. Are you doing it on your own but getting different teams than I am?

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